1 Take hede be tyme leste ye be spyede s1
2 yor lovyng Iyes cane{n'} not hide
3 at last the trwthe will sure be trydetherefore take hede
4 for Som ther be of crafite Kynde
5 thowe yow shew no parte of yor mynde
6 sewrlye there Ies ye can te not nott blyndetherefore take hedefor in lyke case there sselv of dyveris skools
7 ffor in lyke case ther selves ha hathe bene
8 & thoʒtthought ryght sure none had theym sene
9 but it was not as thye did wene2therefore take hede
10 all thowgth theye be of dyvers skoolles{es}
11{es} use & will can yose all craftye toolles
12 at leynthe thye prove them selfs bott foolltherefor take
13 yff theye myght take yow in that trape
14 theye wolde sone leve yet in yor lape
15 to love vnspyed ys but a happetherefore th take hed

1. The shape of the "s" mark suggests that it was made by Margaret Douglas.
2. "Wene" means to think, surmise, or consider.
3. Th W: This is a designation, perhaps of authorship, by an unidentified hand.

Attributed to Sir Thomas Wyatt,[1] the poem was entered by H1 and is unique to this manuscript. An adaption of this poem appears as a ballad in a later Elizabethan manuscript, British Library Harley MS 7578 (fol. 116v), entitled "Tak hede by tym whiles youth doth Rayn." John Milsom suggests that this adaptation is a moralization of Wyatt's poem.[2]